"James Patrick Kelly - St. Theresa of the Aliens" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kelly James Patrick)

the United States. I had the honor, if you can call it that, of representing
InfoLine at the first English-language press conference ever given by an
alien. Of course, no one has ever really seen an alien since they never come
out of their bullet-shaped jump ships. The squat hairless monkeys that they
call their "bodies" are in fact remotely-controlled mechanisms. The aliens
fear the the hostility of the earth's environment and its inhabitants. I have
seen and even talked to these "bodies"; like most people I accept the
mechanism and rarely think about the mysterious and distant alien controlling
it.
As an historic disaster, that press conference has been studied and
restudied. Yet to this day I have difficulty remembering it, no doubt because
it was so closely linked with a personal disaster. I could not sleep the
night before; I was trying to find some middle ground between awe of the
aliens and patriotic suspicion of their motives. Sometime after midnight I
got out of bed. I must have woken Nicole as I prowled around the house; she
came out into the kitchen to fix us both some hot cocoa. I was sorry to have
disturbed her but glad for the company.
"Nervous?" she said.
I shrugged. If I admitted it to her I would have to admit it to
myself.
She set a steaming cup in front of me. "I heard someone on the telelink
saying today that it's going to take more than a press conference to make up
for what they've done wrong already. He said that we shouldn't be listening
to them, they should be
listening to us."
"Morris. He's an asshole."
"Still, most people act as if they know everything just because they
have starships. What if they don't? Maybe what you should do is get up and
ask them who's buried in Grant's Tomb? They'd never figure it out." She
chuckled. "You'd go down as the man who stumped the aliens."
 "Go down, all right." Still, it was worth a smile at three o'clock in
the morning. "Let's talk about something else."
She sipped her cocoa. "Terry called today. She's been asked to join
the central council of the Brides of Christ. She doesn't know whether she
wants to take the vows or not."
"That idiot. What she needs is a real man to sleep with, not a picture
of the Sacred Heart of Jesus."
Nicole stiffened. "That's your prescription, Doctor? Get yourself
some nice warm sex and call in the morning?"
All the warning signs were up but I refused to see them. "Never failed
yet," I said with a leer. "Let's not talk about Terry. We always end up
fighting."
"O.K. Let's talk about us." She considered. "I missed my period. I
wasn't going to tell you until after the press conference but ..."
"You're pregnant? But I've been taking my pills."
"I don't know yet. I have a doctor's appointment Wednesday."
"Nicole, those pills are ninety-nine and nine tenths."
"I know. Do you believe in miracles?"
I think I must have laughed at that. "Are you going to have it?"
"What do you mean, have it?" In that moment she was the only alien in